Complete Works of Earl Derr Biggers Page 2

  “Do you expect Barbara soon?” she inquired presently.

  Dan Winterslip’s face lighted like the beach at sunrise. “Yes, Barbara has graduated. She’ll be along any day now. Nice if she and your perfect nephew should hit on the same boat.”

  “Nice for John Quincy, at any rate,” Miss Minerva replied. “We thought Barbara a lively charming girl when she visited us in the East.”

  “She’s all of that,” he agreed proudly. His daughter was his dearest possession. “I tell you, I’ve missed her. I’ve been mighty lonesome.”

  Miss Minerva gave him a shrewd look. “Yes, I’ve heard rumors,” she remarked, “about how lonesome you’ve been.”

  He flushed under his tan. “Amos, I suppose?”

  “Oh, not only Amos. A great deal of talk, Dan. Really, at your age—”

  “What do you mean, my age? I told you we’re all young out here.” He ate in silence for a moment. “You’re a good sport — I said it and I meant it. You must understand that here in the Islands a man may behave a — a bit differently than he would in the Back Bay.”

  “At that,” she smiled, “all men in the Back Bay are not to be trusted. I’m not presuming to rebuke you, Dan. But — for Barbara’s sake — why not select as the object of your devotion a woman you could marry?”

  “I could marry this one — if we’re talking about the same woman.”

  “The one I refer to,” Miss Minerva replied, “is known, rather widely, as the Widow of Waikiki.”

  “This place is a hotbed of gossip. Arlene Compton is perfectly respectable.”

  “A former chorus girl, I believe.”

  “Not precisely. An actress — small parts — before she married Lieutenant Compton.”

  “And a self-made widow.”

  “Just what do you mean by that?” he flared. His gray eyes glittered.

  “I understand that when her husband’s aeroplane crashed on Diamond Head, it was because he preferred it that way. She had driven him to it.”

  “Lies, all lies!” Dan Winterslip cried. “Pardon me, Minerva, but you mustn’t believe all you hear on the beach.” He was silent for a moment. “What would you say if I told you I proposed to marry this woman?”

  “I’m afraid I’d become rather bromidic,” she answered gently, “and remind you that there’s no fool like an old fool.” He did not speak. “Forgive me, Dan. I’m your first cousin, but a distant relative for all that. It’s really none of my business. I wouldn’t care — but I like you. And I’m thinking of Barbara—”

  He bowed his head. “I know,” he said, “Barbara. Well, there’s no need to get excited. I haven’t said anything to Arlene about marriage. Not yet.”

  Miss Minerva smiled. “You know, as I get on in years,” she remarked, “so many wise old saws begin to strike me as utter nonsense. Particularly that one I just quoted.” He looked at her, his eyes friendly again. “This is the best avocado I ever tasted,” she added. “But tell me, Dan, are you sure the mango is a food? Seems more like a spring tonic to me.”

  By the time they finished dinner the topic of Arlene Compton was forgotten and Dan had completely regained his good nature. They had coffee on his veranda — or, in Island parlance, lanai — which opened off one end of the living-room. This was of generous size, screened on three sides and stretching far down on to the white beach. Outside the brief tropic dusk dimmed the bright colors of Waikiki.

  “No breeze stirring,” said Miss Minerva.

  “The trades have died,” Dan answered. He referred to the beneficent winds which — save at rare, uncomfortable intervals — blow across the Islands out of the cool northeast. “I’m afraid we’re in for a stretch of Kona weather.”

  “I hope not,” Miss Minerva said.

  “It saps the life right out of me nowadays,” he told her, and sank into a chair. “That about being young, Minerva — it’s a little bluff I’m fond of.”

  She smiled gently. “Even youth finds the Kona hard to endure,” she comforted. “I remember when I was here before — in the ‘eighties. I was only nineteen, but the memory of the sick wind lingers still.”

  “I missed you then, Minerva.”

  “Yes. You were off somewhere in the South Seas.”

  “But I heard about you when I came back. That you were tall and blonde and lovely, and nowhere near so prim as they feared you were going to be. A wonderful figure, they said — but you’ve got that yet.”

  She flushed, but smiled still. “Hush, Dan. We don’t talk that way where I come from.”

  “The ‘eighties,” he sighed. “Hawaii was Hawaii then. Unspoiled, a land of opera bouffe, with old Kalakaua sitting on his golden throne.”

  “I remember him,” Miss Minerva said. “Grand parties at the palace. And the afternoons when he sat with his disreputable friends on the royal lanai, and the Royal Hawaiian Band played at his feet, and he haughtily tossed them royal pennies. It was such a colorful, naive spot then, Dan.”

  “It’s been ruined,” he complained sadly. “Too much aping of the mainland. Too much of your damned mechanical civilization — automobiles, phonographs, radios — bah! And yet — and yet, Minerva — away down underneath there are deep dark waters flowing still.”

  She nodded, and they sat for a moment busy with their memories. Presently Dan Winterslip snapped on a small reading light at his side. “I’ll just glance at the evening paper, if you don’t mind.”

  “Oh, do,” urged Miss Minerva.

  She was glad of a moment without talk. For this, after all, was the time she loved Waikiki best. So brief, this tropic dusk, so quick the coming of the soft alluring night. The carpet of the waters, apple-green by day, crimson and gold at sunset, was a deep purple now. On top of that extinct volcano called Diamond Head a yellow eye was winking, as though to hint there might still be fire beneath. Three miles down, the harbor lights began to twinkle, and out toward the reef the lanterns of Japanese sampans glowed intermittently. Beyond, in the road-stead, loomed the battered hulk of an old brig slowly moving toward the channel entrance. Always, out there, a ship or two, in from the East with a cargo of spice or tea or ivory, or eastward bound with a load of tractor salesmen. Ships of all sorts, the spic and span liner and the rakish tramp, ships from Melbourne and Seattle, New York and Yokohama, Tahiti and Rio, any port on the seven seas. For this was Honolulu, the Crossroads of the Pacific — the glamourous crossroads where, they said, in time all paths crossed again. Miss Minerva sighed.

  She was conscious of a quick movement on Dan’s part. She turned and looked at him. He had laid the paper on his knee, and was staring straight ahead. That bluff about being young — no good now. For his face was old, old.

  “Why, Dan—” she said.

  “I — I’m wondering, Minerva,” he began slowly. “Tell me again about that nephew of yours.”

  She was surprised, but hid it. “John Quincy?” she said. “He’s just the usual thing, for Boston. Conventional. His whole life has been planned for him, from the cradle to the grave. So far he’s walked the line. The inevitable preparatory school, Harvard, the proper clubs, the family banking house — even gone and got himself engaged to the very girl his mother would have picked for him. There have been times when I hoped he might kick over — the war — but no, he came back and got meekly into the old rut.”

  “Then he’s reliable — steady?”

  Miss Minerva smiled. “Dan, compared with that boy, Gibraltar wabbles occasionally.”

  “Discreet, I take it?”

  “He invented discretion. That’s what I’m telling you. I love him — but a little bit of recklessness now and then — However, I’m afraid it’s too late now. John Quincy is nearly thirty.”

  Dan Winterslip was on his feet, his manner that of a man who had made an important decision. Beyond the bamboo curtain that hung in the door leading to the living-room a light appeared. “Haku!” Winterslip called. The Jap came swiftly.

  “Haku, tell the chauffeur — quick — the big
car! I must get to the dock before the President Tyler sails for San Francisco. Wikiwiki!”

  The servant disappeared into the living-room, and Winterslip followed. Somewhat puzzled, Miss Minerva sat for a moment, then rose and pushed aside the curtain. “Are you sailing, Dan?” she asked.

  He was seated at his desk, writing hurriedly. “No, no — just a note — I must get it off on that boat—”

  There was an air of suppressed excitement about him. Miss Minerva stepped over the threshold into the living-room. In another moment Haku appeared with an announcement that was unnecessary, for the engine of an automobile was humming in the drive. Dan Winterslip took his hat from the Jap. “Make yourself at home, Minerva — I’ll be back shortly,” he cried, and rushed out.

  Some business matter, no doubt. Miss Minerva strolled aimlessly about the big airy room, pausing finally before the portrait of Jedediah Winterslip, the father of Dan and Amos, and her uncle. Dan had had it painted from a photograph after the old man’s death; it was the work of an artist whose forte was reputed to be landscapes — oh, it must assuredly have been landscapes. Miss Minerva thought. But even so there was no mistaking the power and personality of this New Englander who had set up in Honolulu as a whaler. The only time she had seen him, in the ‘eighties, he had been broken and old, mourning his lost fortune, which had gone with his ships in an Arctic disaster a short time before.

  Well, Dan had brought the family back, Miss Minerva reflected. Won again that lost fortune and much more. There were queer rumors about his methods — but so there were about the methods of Bostonians who had never strayed from home. A charming fellow, whatever his past. Miss Minerva sat down at the grand piano and played a few old familiar bars — The Beautiful Blue Danube. Her thoughts went back to the ‘eighties.

  Dan Winterslip was thinking of the ‘eighties too as his car sped townward along Kalakaua Avenue. But it was the present that concerned him when they reached the dock and he ran, panting a little, through a dim pier shed toward the gangplank of the President Tyler. He had no time to spare, the ship was on the point of sailing. Since it was a through boat from the Orient it left without the ceremonies that attend the departure of a liner plying only between Honolulu and the mainland. Even so, there were cries of “Aloha,” some hearty and some tremulous, most of the travelers were bedecked with leis, and a confused little crowd milled about the foot of the plank.

  Dan Winterslip pushed his way forward and ran up the sharp incline. As he reached the deck he encountered an old acquaintance, Hepworth, the second officer.

  “You’re the man I’m looking for,” he cried.

  “How are you, sir,” Hepworth said. “I didn’t see your name on the list.”

  “No, I’m not sailing. I’m here to ask a favor.”

  “Glad to oblige, Mr. Winterslip.”

  Winterslip thrust a letter into his hand. “You know my cousin Roger in ‘Frisco. Please give him that — him and no one else — as soon after you land as you possibly can. I’m too late for the mail — and I prefer this way anyhow. I’ll be mighty grateful.”

  “Don’t mention it — you’ve been very kind to me and I’ll be only too happy — I’m afraid you’ll have to go ashore, sir. Just a minute, there—” He took Winterslip’s arm and gently urged him back on to the plank. The instant Dan’s feet touched the dock, the plank was drawn up behind him.

  For a moment he stood, held by the fascination an Islander always feels at sight of a ship outward bound. Then he turned and walked slowly through the pier-shed. Ahead of him he caught a glimpse of a slender lithe figure which he recognized at once as that of Dick Kaohla, the grandson of Kamaikui. He quickened his pace and joined the boy.

  “Hello, Dick,” he said.

  “Hello.” The brown face was sullen, unfriendly.

  “You haven’t been to see me for a long time,” Dan Winterslip said. “Everything all right?”

  “Sure,” replied Kaohla. “Sure it’s all right.” They reached the street, and the boy turned quickly away “Good night,” he muttered.

  Dan Winterslip stood for a moment, thoughtfully looking after him. Then he got into the car. “No hurry now,” he remarked to the chauffeur.

  When he reappeared in his living-room, Miss Minerva glanced up from the book she was reading. “Were you in time, Dan?” she asked.

  “Just made it,” he told her.

  “Good,” she said, rising. “I’ll take my book and go up-stairs. Pleasant dreams.”

  He waited until she reached the door before he spoke. “Ah — Minerva — don’t trouble to write your nephew about stopping here.”

  “No, Dan?” she said, puzzled again.

  “No. I’ve attended to the invitation myself. Good night.”

  “Oh — good night,” she answered, and left him.

  Alone in the great room, he paced restlessly back and forth over the polished floor. In a moment he went out on to the lanai, and found the newspaper he had been reading earlier in the evening. He brought it back to the living-room and tried to finish it, but something seemed to trouble him. His eyes kept straying — straying — with a sharp exclamation he tore one corner from the shipping page, savagely ripped the fragment to bits.

  Again he got up and wandered about. He had intended paying a call down the beach, but that quiet presence in the room above — Boston in its more tolerant guise but Boston still — gave him pause.

  He returned to the lanai. There, under a mosquito netting, was the cot where he preferred to sleep; his dressing-room was near at hand. However, it was too early for bed. He stepped through the door on to the beach. Unmistakable, the soft treacherous breath of the Kona fanned his cheek — the “sick wind” that would pile the breakers high along the coast and blight temporarily this Island paradise. There was no moon, the stars that usually seemed so friendly and so close were now obscured. The black water rolled in like a threat. He stood staring out into the dark — out there to the crossroads where paths always crossed again. If you gave them time — if you only gave them time —

  As he turned back, his eyes went to the algaroba tree beyond the wire, and he saw the yellow flare of a match. His brother Amos. He had a sudden friendly feeling for Amos, he wanted to go over and talk to him, talk of the far days when they played together on this beach. No use, he knew. He sighed, and the screen door of the lanai banged behind him — the screen door without a lock in a land where locks are few.

  Tired, he sat in the dark to think. His face was turned toward the curtain of bamboo between him and the living-room. On that curtain a shadow appeared, was motionless a second, then vanished. He caught his breath — again the shadow. “Who’s there?” he called.

  A huge brown arm was thrust through the bamboo. A friendly brown face was framed there.

  “Your fruit I put on the table,” said Kamaikui. “I go bed now.”

  “Of course. Go ahead. Good night.”

  The woman withdrew. Dan Winterslip was furious with himself. What was the matter with him, anyhow? He who had fought his way through unspeakable terrors in the early days — nervous — on edge —

  “Getting old,” he muttered. “No, by heaven — it’s the Kona. That’s it. The Kona. I’ll be all right when the trades blow again.”

  When the trades blew again! He wondered. Here at the crossroads one could not be sure.

  CHAPTER II

  THE HIGH HAT

  JOHN QUINCY WINTERSLIP walked aboard the ferry at Oakland feeling rather limp and weary. For more than six days he had been marooned on sleepers — his pause at Chicago had been but a flitting from one train to another — and he was fed up. Seeing America first — that was what he had been doing. And what an appalling lot of it there was! He felt that for an eternity he had been staring at endless plains, dotted here and there by unesthetic houses the inmates of which had unquestionably never heard a symphony concert.

  Ahead of him ambled a porter, bearing his two suit-cases, his golf clubs and his hat-box. One of the man
’s hands was gone — chewed off, no doubt, in some amiable frontier scuffle. In its place he wore a steel hook. Well, no one could question the value of a steel hook to a man in the porter’s profession. But how quaint — and western!

  The boy indicated a spot by the rail on the forward deck, and the porter began to unload. Carefully selecting the man’s good hand, John Quincy dropped into it a tip so generous as to result in a touching of hook to cap in a weird salute. The object of this attention sank down amid his elaborate trappings, removed the straw hat from his perspiring head, and tried to figure out just what had happened to him.

  Three thousand miles from Beacon Street, and two thousand miles still to go! Why, he inquired sourly of his usually pleasant self, had he ever agreed to make this absurd expedition into heathen country? Here it was late June, Boston was at its best. Tennis at Longwood, long mild evenings in a single shell on the Charles, week-ends and golf with Agatha Parker at Magnolia. And if one must travel, there was Paris. He hadn’t seen Paris in two years and had been rather planning a quick run over, when his mother had put this preposterous notion into his head.

  Preposterous — it was all of that. Traveling five thousand miles just as a gentle hint to Aunt Minerva to return to her calm, well-ordered life behind purple window-panes on Beacon Street. And was there any chance that his strong-minded relative would take the hint? Not one in a thousand. Aunt Minerva was accustomed to do as she pleased — he had an uncomfortable, shocked recollection of one occasion when she had said she would do as she damn well pleased.

  John Quincy wished he was back. He wished he was crossing Boston Common to his office on State Street, there to put out a new issue of bonds. He was not yet a member of the firm — that was an honor accorded only to Winterslips who were bald and a little stooped — but his heart was in his work. He put out a bond issue with loving apprehension, waiting for the verdict as a play-wright waits behind the scenes on a first night. Would those First Mortgage Sixes go over big, or would they flop at his feet?